today, Alex and I stopped off to get the newspaper. The girl in the shop, probably trying to make conversation, made a comment about Alex's weight of 58Kgs (128 pounds) which at 6'1" puts him in the severely underweight category. Her suggestion that he was lucky to be so slim was met with sharp and to the point response from Alex, "Oral cancer will do that to you". Even faced with such an insensitive (and common) remark, Alex still registered her discomfort as the horror of what she had said dawned on her and softened it with "but I am better now and lucky to be alive". I think it was the shop assistant who was lucky to be alive because if it had been up to me to respond, my choice of words would have ruined her day. I feel sorry for her now, but at the time bodily harm was part of my thinking. Even so, I don't think we will buy the paper there anymore.